Introduction. Social justice and the voice of the child -- Social interactionist models of professional practice -- The boundaries of language and knowledge -- A chapter guide -- Overall principles. Thinking about young people and childhood. Creating distance The nineteenth century -- childhood in its infancy -- Sharpening the focus -- The child and the parent -- Locating interventions -- Care and regulation. Young people and the children's workforce. Lesley -- Stigma -- Confinement -- Technologies -- Testing children -- Psychopathologies and social exclusion -- A matrix for the tasks of children's services. Assessing young children and young people in social contexts. Professional practice -- Contexts -- Common assessment -- Can professionals (afford to) be human? -- Assessments and relationships -- Psychodynamic accounts -- Future work -- Representing children and young people in assessments. Of history, memory and the making of knowledge -- Political critique or social scientific theory? -- Theoretical preferences -- Language and the social -- Professional practice as relationships -- Five question-themes -- Luke. Children feeling, thinking and learning. A history of thinking and feeling -- The mind in the machine -- Theories in practice -- Feeling, thinking and learning -- Notes for the future. Voices of children and young people in assessment. Public and private law -- Legislative contexts of assessment -- Contexts for assessment in Children Act proceedings -- Principles of assessment. Working with autistic children. Professional voices -- James -- Symbols and friends -- Professional practices -- Final thoughts. Narrative science. Narratives in practice -- Principles of narrative practice -- Narrative assessments -- Making a choice: when parents and young people disagree. Ethics, Commitment and the limits of advocacy: public and private lives. Opposing the voice of the child -- Identity and commitment -- Ethical resources -- Five question-themes.

public and private lives.